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Archive for March 2nd, 2011

Rotterdam is Europe’s main port, the port area stretches along the Rhine from the city centre towards the sea, its industries and cranes are the icons of the port city. The north east of Rotterdam is a sharp contrast to the general image of the city dominated by industrial activity and modern architecture: a green suburban area of great natural beauty. The historic neighbourhood of Kralingen, parklands, the river Rotte and a series of lakes with riparian leisure facilities such as yacht harbours mark this affluent part of the city. The area would be a real oasis in the dense urban fabric but it is brutally split by a motorway and train rail. The main artery of the Benelux, a motorway which connects the 3 main ports and generates constant traffic and pollution, cuts through this green area. The main eastern train lines run next to the motorway. Crouched against the infrastructure a series of industries are located, in a strange paradox surrounded by the nicest parks of the city.

The assignment was to relocate the new head offices of a film and TV production company (recording, editing, dubbing and audiovisual production). The program of functions can be classified in four parts: management and administrative area (offices and meeting rooms), technical rooms (audio, image, set and backstage), common public area (multifunctional space, toilets and cafeteria) and installation area (machine and storage rooms).

Lebanon Waterfront City first recognizes its privileged position in the vicinity of Beirut and its essential condition as a place where land and water more than meet, they entwine. It arranges its composition as a smooth transition from the waters of the Mediterranean to the mountainous backdrop all-the-while celebrating the “tamed water” of the marina basin and the graceful vessels that dot it by framing its ever-changing ever-playful composition with a most elegant, superbly appointed promenade.

A typical 2 Bedroom 59 sqm Tel-Aviv apartment transformed to accommodate a new baby on the way.

In order to allow an addition of a second bedroom, the architects had to rethink the apartment’s circulation in a bid to gain further habitable space, which meant removing all corridors and unused storage spaces.

Fogo Island lies on the edge of Newfoundland, Canada and is home to a gentle, independent people who have lived for centuries between wind and waves in pursuit of fish. Fogo Islanders live in the untamed landscape of the North Atlantic. The people are subtle and unpretentious yet have seen their traditional way of life by threatened by forces largely beyond their control.

The design of this small residence on a corner lot in the City of Minneapolis was conceived as a progression of defined volumes: beginning with the public front yard, continuing with the two-story portion of the home, following with the tall volume of the living area, the enclosed garden and the garage.

The Kaohsiung Public Library is a new state-of-the-art multimedia research, study and entertainment space that allows for maximum flexibility. Visitors experience public spaces together at an exhibition or show, or they can “get together to be alone” to read or study. Mecanoo’s response to the design competition comes in the form of a singular building, designed as a garden, which emerges on the site in the shape of a monumental ‘green’ cube.

Over the last 5,000 years man has worked hard to over power the natural world through the built environment— we propose to revolutionize this position. Australia possesses one of the most beautiful and dramatic geologies in the world. It is our desire to create a new type of architecture— one that is more in the family of nature than of the built environment.

The house and the shared inhabitance are about association between two or more different individuals. The shared inhabitance draws in dialectical oppositions: It draws in different and even contradictory behaviors, habits, necessities, activities. The shared inhabitance leads to complex interrelations: coincidental or intentional.